This application is also related to the following United States Patent Application, filed on even date herewith:
COMMON APPLICATION METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho, Stephen Brodsky, and James Rhyne,
COBOL METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho, Nick Tindall, James Rhyne, Tony Tsai, Peter Elderon, and Shahaf Abileah.
PL/I METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho, Peter Elderon, Eugene Dong and Tony Tsai.
TYPE DESCRIPTOR METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho, James Rhyne, Peter Elderon, Nick Tindall, and Tony Tsai.
IMS TRANSACTION MESSAGES METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho and Shahaf Abileah.
IMS-MFS (MESSAGE FORMAT SERVICE) METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho, Benjamin Sheats, Elvis Halcrombe, and Chenhuei J. Chiang.
CICS-BMS (BASIC MESSAGE SERVICE) METAMODEL by Shyh-Mei Ho, Andy Krasum, and Benjamin Sheats.
The invention relates to exchanging instructions and/or data between applications to signal readiness to transfer, exchange, or process data, or to establish at least one or more parameters for transferring data between the applications, and controlling the parameters in order to facilitate data transfer and communication. The invention further relates to integrating dissimilar applications one executing within one platform and another executing in another platform, e.g., multiple computers, multiple operating systems, multiple application components, multiple development environments, multiple deployment environments, or multiple testing and processing, establishing a dialog (e.g., a negotiation) with one another in order to establish connectivity for transferring data and/or instructions between the applications so as to facilitate performing tasks on the data or portions thereof to accomplish an overall goal. The parameters may include one or more of format, data types, data structures, or commands.
The growth of e-business has created a significant need to integrate legacy applications and bring them to the Internet This is because the current trend for new applications is to embrace Web standards that simplify end user application construction and scalability. Moreover, as new applications are created, it is crucial to seamlessly integrate them with existing systems while facilitating the introduction of new business processes and paradigms.
Integrating new applications with existing applications is especially critical since industry analysts estimate that more than seventy percent of corporate data, including data highly relevant to e-commerce, lives on mainframe computers. Moreover, while many e-commerce transactions are initiated on Windows, Mac, and Linux end user platforms, using a variety of Web browsers, and go through Windows NT and Unix servers, they are ultimately completed on mainframe computers, running mainframe applications, and impacting data stored in mainframe databases.
There are e-business pressures to integrate server level applications and bring them to the Internet. However, there is no complete and easy mechanism to integrate or e-business enable the applications. Integration, whether through messaging, procedure calls, or database queries, is key to solving many of today""s business problems.
Integrating legacy applications with new software is a difficult and expensive task due, in large part, to the need to customize each connection that ties together two disparate applications. There is no single mechanism to describe how one application may allow itself to be invoked by another.
One consequence is an e-commerce environment of multiple applications, developed by multiple development teams, running on different platforms, with different data types, data structures, commands, and command syntax""s. This environment is stitched together with application program interfaces and connectors. Connectors are an essential part of the total application framework for e-commerce. Connectors match interface requirements of disparate applications and map between disparate interfaces.
This growing interconnection of old and new software systems and applications, has led to various middle ware applications and connector applications, interface specifications, interface definitions, and code, especially for the interconnection and interaction of markup languages (such as HTML, XML, Dynamic HTML, WML, and the like), through object oriented languages such as SmallTalk and C++, with languages of legacy application server applications (such as HIGH LEVEL ASSEMBLER). These interface specifications, definitions, and code should apply across languages, tools, applications, operating systems, and networks so that an end user experiences the look, feel, and responses of a single, seamless application at her terminal. Instead, the proliferation of standards, protocols, specifications, definitions, and code, e.g., Common Object Request Broker (CORBA), Common Object Model (COM), Object Linking and Embedding (OLE), SOM, ORB Plus, Object Broker, Orbix, has instead created an e-commerce xe2x80x9cTower of Babel.xe2x80x9d
Examples of application integration are ubiquitous: from installing an ERP system, to updating an Operational Data Store (ODS) with IMS transactions or invoking CRM systems from MQSeries; each of these requires the same basic steps. First, a user must find the entity she wants to communicate with, then she must figure out how to invoke the entity, and finally she must provide translation from one native representation to another. Today, these steps usually require manual investigation and hand codingxe2x80x94and leave the developers with a rat""s-nest of hard-to-maintain connections between applications.
Attempts to remedy this situation involve application program interfaces and connectors, which are frequently built on Interface Definition Languages. Interface Definition Languages are declarative, defining application program interfaces, and, in some cases, issues such as error handling. Most Interface Definition Languages are a subset of C++, and specify a component""s attributes, the parent classes that it inherits from, the exceptions that it raises, the typed events that it emits, the methods its interface supports, input and output parameters, and data types. The goal of Interface Definition Languages within connectors is to enable collaboration between dissimilar applications without hard coded application program interfaces.
Ideally, the interface definition language, and the connector of which it is a part, should facilitate full run-time software application collaboration through such features as
Method invocation with strong type checking,
Run-time method invocation with greater flexibility and run time binding,
High level language binding, with the interface separated from the implementation.
An interface repository containing real time information of server functions and parameters.
Additionally, the connector and its interface definition language, should be fast, efficient, scalable, portable, support metaclasses, support syntactic level extensions, and support semantic level extensions.
The problems associated with integrating new applications, for example, e-commerce applications, with legacy applications are obviated by the Common Application Metamodel tool, method, and system described herein. The Common Application Metamodel method, tool, and system of the invention facilitate tooling solutions, data translation, and communication and collaboration between dissimilar and disparate applications, as well as full run-time software application collaboration through an interface with the application server interface domain. This is accomplished through metadata interchange information, method invocation with strong type checking, run-time method invocation, run time binding, and high level language binding, with the interface separated from the implementation, and an interface repository containing real time information of client and server interface parameters.
Additionally, the tool, method, and system of the invention provide fast, efficient, and scalable interconnectivity independently of any tool or middleware, are reusable and portable, and support metaclasses, syntactic level extensions, and semantic level extensions, and are independent of any particular tool or middleware.
The Common Application Metamodel tool, method, and system is especially useful for providing a data transformer that is bi-directional between a client application and a server application, transmitting commands and data both ways between, for example, a Java, HTML, XML, C, or C++ application and a High Level Assembler application.
One embodiment of the invention is a method of processing a transaction on or between an end user application and one or more application servers. The method comprises the steps of initiating the transaction on the end user application in a first language with a first application program, transmitting the transaction to the server, and converting the transaction from the first language of the first end user application to a language running on the application server. Typically, as described above, the client will be a thin client or a Web browser, the application running on the client will be a Web browser application or a thin client connectivity application, and the language of the client application will be Java, C, C++, or a markup language, as HTML or a derivative of HTML, such as XML or Dynamic HTML or WML, or the like, and the language running on the server is HLASM (High Level Assembler) or the like. The invention facilitates transformers which convert the transaction from the first language of the end user application to a language running on the application server. After conversion, the converted transaction is processed on the application server.
The application processes the request and then sends the response from the application server back to the end user application. Typically, as described above, the application server will be running a high level assembler based application, and the client will be a thin client written in Java or C or C++, or a Web browser, running a Web browser application or a thin client connectivity application, in a markup language, as HTML or a derivative of HTML, such as XML or Dynamic HTML, or the like. The invention provides data transformers which convert the response from the language or languages running on the application server or servers to the first language of the first end user application.
The end user application and the application server have at least one data transformer between them. In this way, the steps of (i) converting the request from the first language of the first end user application as a source language to the language running on an application server, e.g., high level assembler, as a target language, and (ii) converting the response from the high level assembler language running on the application server, as a subsequent source language, back to the first language of the first end user application, as a subsequent target language, each comprise the steps of invoking type descriptor and language metamodels of respective source and target languages, populating the metamodels with each of the respective source and target languages"" data items and types, and converting the source language to the target language.
The end user application is, frequently, a web browser or a thin client. When the end user application is a Web browser, the end user is connected to the application server through a web server. According to a further embodiment of the invention, the web server may comprise the connector, or data transformer. The data transformer integrated with the Web server may directly convert the request, transaction, or message from a browser oriented form to an application server language or to an intermediate, business or commerce oriented markup language, such as XML.
The CAM metamodel used to construct the converter comprises an invocation metamodel, an application domain interface metamodel, a language metamodel, and a type descriptor metamodel. Exemplary invocation metamodel includes information chosen from the group consisting of message control information, security data, transactional semantics, trace and debug information, pre-condition and post-condition resources, and user data, etc. Exemplary application domain interface metamodel comprises information chosen from input parameter signatures, output parameter signatures, and return types. Application domain interface metamodel uses one or more language metamodels, such as high level assembler metamodels.
The type descriptor metamodel defines physical realizations, storage mapping, data types, data structures, and realization constraints.
The method of the invention is applicable to situations where one of the source or target languages is object oriented, and the other of the target or source languages is not object oriented. In this situation, the language metamodel and the type descriptor metamodel together map encapsulated objects of the object oriented language into code and data of the language that is not object oriented. Additionally, the language metamodel and the type descriptor metamodel maps object inheritances of the object oriented language into references and pointers in the language that is not object oriented. The method of the invention is also applicable to situations where different object oriented languages are running on different platforms, and encapsulated objects of the source language (code and data) are mapped into encapsulated objects of the target language. The method of the invention is also applicable where different procedural languages are running on different platforms or applications and commands and data of the source procedural language are mapped into the target procedural language.
According to the method of the invention, there may be a plurality of applications for vertical (sequential, conditional, or dependent) processing, for horizontal (parallel in time) processing, or both horizontal and vertical processing. This is to support rich transactions to and through multiple hierarchical levels and multiple parallel sequences of processing. This may be the case in business to business transactions drawing upon financial, manufacturing, scheduling, supply, and shipping databases and servers, and utilizing various commercial security instruments.
A further aspect of the invention is a client-server processing system having a client, a server, and at least one transformer between the client and one or more servers.
A still further aspect of the invention is a processing system configured and controlled to interact with a client application. In this aspect of the invention, the system comprises, a server, and at least one transformer between the server and the client application, where the client has an end user application, and is controlled and configured to initiate a request with the server in a first language with a first application program and to transmit the request through a transformer to the server or servers. The server processes the request in a second software application, using a second language, and returns a response to the client through a transformer.
A further aspect of the invention is a groupware system having a plurality of e-mail enabled end user applications, such as e-mail, word processing, spreadsheet, simple database management (such as Lotus Approach or Microsoft Access), graphics and graphics editing, audio and audio editing, and computer-telephony integration (xe2x80x9cCTIxe2x80x9d), along with client level content database client services and content replication client services. Groupware integrates these e-mail enabled applications through one or more transformers and application program interfaces with transport services, directory services, and storage services, including content servers and replication servers. The groupware system is configured and controlled to communicate among disparate end user applications, among disparate servers, and between disparate servers and end user applications. The groupware system comprises at least one transformer between a server and an end user application. The end user application is controlled and configured to participate with a server in a first language of a first application program and the server is configured and controlled to participate with the client in a second language of a second program.
The transformer is configured and controlled to receive a request from the end user application, and convert the request from the first language of the first end user application to high level assembler language running on the server. The server is configured and controlled to receive the converted request from the transformer and process the request in a second language with a second application program residing on the server, and to thereafter transmit a response through a transformer back to the end user application.
A still further embodiment of the invention is the provision of rich transaction processing. Rich transactions are nested transactions that span to, through, and/or across multiple servers. The spanning across nested servers may be horizontal, that is parallel dependent transactions, or vertical, that is, serial dependent transactions. Rich transactions may be long lived, on-going transactions, or complex business-to-business transactions, especially those with multiple dependencies or contingencies, volume and prompt payment discounts, late delivery and late payment penalties, and with financial processing, such as electronic letters of credit, electronic bills of lading, electronic payment guarantees, electronic payment, escrow, security interests in the goods, and the like. In a rich transaction environment, some transaction servers may be positioned as clients with respect to other transactions for certain sub transactions making up the rich transaction.
A still further embodiment of the invention is a tool, that is, a software developer""s kit, characterized in that the program product is a storage medium (as a tape, floppy disks, a CD-ROM, or a hard drive or hard drives on one of more computers) having invocation metamodels, application domain interface metamodels, and language metamodels, and computer instructions for building a metamodel repository of source and target language metamodels. The program product also contains computer instructions for building connector stubs from the metamodels. The program product further carries computer instructions to build a transformer.
While the invention has been described in summary form as having a single level of connectors, it is, of course, to be understood that such connectors may be present at various levels in the processing hierarchy, for example between Web Clients and Web servers, between web servers and application servers, between application servers and database servers, and between application servers or database servers or both and various specialized repositories.
It is also to be understood, that while the invention has been summarized in terms of individual clients and individual servers, there may be multiple clients, multiple servers, and applications that function as both clients and servers, as exemplified by groupware applications, and there might be multiple parallel lines and/or multiple hierarchical levels of application servers, data servers, and databases, as in systems for rich transactions.